Fork in the Road: Decisions, decisions, decisions

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If I learned anything this past summer, it
is that the lyrics to The Stones’ song, “You
Can’t Always Get What You Want” ring true
for the life of a young career-minded adult.

Many of us have been indoctrinated with a
laundry list of goals we are supposed to reach
by a certain age. Moreover, many of us have
concrete ideas of what we should be doing
with our lives and what will supposedly lead
us to a life of happiness.

There is nothing wrong with having goals
or dreams; however, when either leads to an
inflexible predetermined life course, it rarely
works out in your favour. In other words, life
comes to you and maintaining tunnel vision
could prevent you from seeing other opportunities
that you may have never considered
for yourself.

This summer proved illuminative for me.
For the past several years, I have been working
at a dead-end job. While I gathered a fair
amount of satisfaction from the position in
knowing that I was truly valued, the reality
was that there was no possible upward mobility
in my former place of employment given
the fact that it only had two paid employees:
myself and my boss.

Although I was saddened at the thought of
leaving, I knew it was time to move on. For
months, I responded to various job postings
only to be repeatedly disappointed by the unsatisfactory
offers I received. The grand next
step that you hear about so frequently seemed
to be forever out of reach.

Suddenly, I had three promising prospects
and the problem of finding a job was replaced
with deciding which one I wanted. What
made the decision difficult for me was each
potential opportunity appealed to a different
aspect of my personality and career goals.

While one offer allowed me to work within
the creative industries, another allowed me
to upgrade my administrative and managerial
skillsets, and the third offered the security
and higher compensation of the public sector.

After numerous sleepless nights, I made
my decision. Despite the appeal of the stability,
room for growth and greater compensation
offered by the second two offers, I needed to
allow my creativity time to flourish within
the first job offered.

Though it seemed ideal, I am sad to tell you
that it only took a couple of hours at the new
job to realize I made the wrong decision and
lost out on two other opportunities, which
would have been better suited for me.

Why did I allow myself to be led by my
right brain even though I knew instinctually
it was the riskiest move? Why – when I supposedly
got what I wanted – was I miserable?

It comes down to one simple answer: we
think we know ourselves better than we actually
do.

Prior to getting a career-driven job, I pursued
the arts and achieved several noteworthy
accolades. The sad truth, however, is that
there is increasingly less money to be made
in this field and given my life goals, I needed
to find a means of actually making a decent
living.

Without a promise of financial security, I
shelved my artistic self in pursuit of a steady
career, hiding from my employers the fact
that I had ever won awards or been featured
on magazine covers. Living in such a manner
made me feel like I was not being authentic.

Given the fact that my previous jobs had
my inner creative side living in a shadow, I
am sure you can also see why I jumped at the
opportunity to be employed where my artistic
background was considered an asset even
though it was the riskiest of the choices.

It was when I realized I am more left
brained than right brained when things went
wrong. I was committed to a vision of myself
as exclusively creative and for that reason I
lost out on two amazing jobs and lost sight
of the fact that I have many strengths in other
areas.

Among the most important attributes of a
successful work environment are organization,
clear expectations, communication and
the ability to work independently. The creative
job failed on all four.

The lesson learned here is that the successful
navigator of life is open and willing to
accept and welcome new possibilities, especially
with respect to one’s self-concept.

A mere two weeks following this debacle, I
was offered a position that was more appealing
than all three of the aforementioned prospects.
Patience is a virtue, my friends.

Interrobang

The Interrobang is published weekly by the Fanshawe Student Union at 1001 Fanshawe College Blvd in London, Ontario and distributed throughout the Fanshawe College community.